CEE Working Group Moves Toward Shared Framework for C&I Clean Water Pumps

Underexplored to Date, Pumps Offer Dramatic Savings Potential

February 23, 2018

The CEE C&I Pumps Working Group has determined that new federal standards and test procedures now provide an opportunity for pump market transformation. As a result, they are working toward a future CEE commercial and industrial pump systems initiative and specification. With the federal standards and test procedures forming a basis for energy efficiency differentiation among pump products, a proposed CEE initiative would define energy efficient pumps for the first time, providing a credible and consistent basis for program administrators to support the highest efficiency products and creating an opportunity for efficiency advancement of the pump market as a whole.

The planned 2020 federal minimum energy performance level for clean water pumps is predicted to save 0.29 quads of primary energy in the next 30 years, equal to almost 85 million MWh. CEE member analysis estimates that savings in the same period from the installation of pumps performing at higher efficiency levels would reach an additional 0.80 quads or 234 million MWh.

After a DOE Energy Conservation Standard and Test Procedure were finalized in January 2016, CEE members formed a C&I Pumps Working Group in order to explore efficiency differentiation above the minimum in the clean water pump market. The Working Group has now concluded that the test procedure, energy performance metric, and labeling requirements of the DOE rule create a credible and consistent means by which the market can differentiate covered pump products based on energy performance. This, in turn, creates an opportunity for program administrators to identify and support the most efficient products through a market strategy laid out in a CEE Initiative and accompanying product specification. Future areas of exploration for a possible pump systems initiative may include:

Pump system assessments

Enhanced pump system communication, controls, and diagnostics

Pump system design guidance

Pump sizing and selection guidance

Pump repair or replacement guidance

CEE is actively recruiting member organization program designers to join the CEE C&I Pumps Working Group and collaborate with program peers to design a consensus path forward for pump efficiency.

The Working Group is now in the process of developing a draft initiative, drawing on the experience of member program administrators as well as the expertise of pump industry partners, who have been strongly supportive of program administrator efforts. Using publicly available product information sources and data provided by the pump manufacturer trade association, the Hydraulics Institute, the Working Group plans to compile a dataset of available pump products and use it to assess the market. These data could form the basis for the development of one or more energy performance tiers for each product category appropriate for a CEE product specification.

Don’t lose out on this chance to shape the efficiency opportunity for clean water pumps. To find out more, or to discuss staff from your CEE member organization joining the C&I Pumps Working Group, contact program manager Walker Larsen.

About CEECEE is an award-winning consortium of efficiency program administrators from the United States and Canada. Members work to unify program approaches across jurisdictions to increase the success of efficiency in markets. By joining forces at CEE, individual electric and gas efficiency programs are able to partner not only with each other, but also with other industries, trade associations, and government agencies. Working together, administrators leverage the effect of their ratepayer funding, exchange information on successful practices and, by doing so, achieve greater energy efficiency for the public good.